Like going to the dentist, making a back-up of your valuable data is often a task that is put off until a later date or perhaps forgotten about altogether.  Even knowing that the results could have dire consequences seems to make no difference as many feel that disaster would never happen to them so why take the time and trouble to perform a backup.

Everything I'm telling you about today was the result of a meeting around a month ago with Mike Lampietro of Adobe a demo and some slides, as and when the new versions are available which I am told is likely to be around the end of September I will try various things for myself in separate reviews.

While most companies involved in the development of graphics software tend to concentrate on a traditional approach to market their wares, even though they might also have a web-based store, Xara is an exception in that the company adopts a total web orientated strategy. If you want to purchase a Xara product, such as the company's Xtreme Pro 4.

The human mind is a wonderful thing but it can become too easily confused; it can forget things and it is selective about what it remembers.  Ask any group of people that have just come out of a meeting or a brainstorm and you would be amazed at what they remember.

What do you do while waiting for one of today's large applications to install itself?  This question sprang to mind recently while I waited for a Corel product to complete its installation process.  I found myself reminiscing about the time when the company set about encouraging the uptake of CD media by offering the current version of its graphics software at a cheaper price if you purchased the CD rather than floppy version.

PDF Converter Professional 5 sets out to allow the user to create and edit files using the ubiquitous Adobe PDF standard that dominates the electronic document market plus take a PDF file and convert it into a range of other popular common text file formats. As is standard practice with Nuance products (and it has to be said those from several other companies as well), you will need to enter a product serial number. In this case it consists of 16 characters.

continues to hold a fascination with the developers of computer games.  I have lost count of the number of titles that are based on this particular geographical location.  With its various stories and legends concerning Pharaohs, gods and other supernatural forces that excite our imagination, what more could you want.  The latest such offering to find its way on to my desktop is Ashley Jones - The Heart of Egypt.

Put together the names of Van Helsing and Brad Stoker in the same sentence could only result in the main subject matter being that of Dracula.  In this case Dracula is the central character in a game developed by Frogware Studios.  Entitled Dracula: Origin, this is a point and click adventure game that places the user in the role of Van Helsing as he searches for that walking one-way blood bank known as the Prince of Darkness.

Over a quarter of a century has passed during which I've written more software than I care to think about and I still have all the bad habits I started out with before that course. Nessy Fingers aims to get hold of kids they've learnt the wrong way to type and instil in them typing skills that are virtually a dying art. before With the prevalence of computers of course you have to get them very young, Nessy Fingers is aimed at 8+ years group.

When it comes to creating an investigative adventure computer game, where better to start than with the doyen of detectives, that redoubtable resident of 221B Baker Street, known as Sherlock Holmes.  Taking this premise, and adding in Arsène Lupin a French gentleman thief who features in a series of novels by Maurice Leblance, the developers Frogwares has come up with Sherlock Holmes: Nemesis.

From the back and side, the box certainly looked like the standard packaging used by Symantec for its utility products.  However turning the box around revealed a see-through panel showing the software CD as if indicating that the enclosed product could see through any malicious attack made on your system.  This product is Norton 360 version 2.0 which arrives with the promise of providing all-in-one security with comprehensive, automatic protection.

Entitled Mystery PI: The Vegas Heist, you are cast in the role of the enigmatic, never-give-up, clue seeking private investigator who takes on the task of discovering the missing money.  This being , the recovery of the money is regarded as being far more important than apprehending those responsible for the heist.  Presumably less-savoury characters will deal out the punishment to those involved but that plays no part in this game.

I have to admit, that as a child, the job of being a bus driver, or any type of driver for that matter, did not feature to high in the list of possible future careers that I considered in any moments of wishful thinking.  Buses were merely a mode of transport for my own convenience rather than an object of affection such as my collection of cigarette and bubble gum cards.

When reviewing hardware I usually start with the dimensions and I suppose the equivalent for software are it's system requirements. Windows XP (Service Pack 2) or Windows Vista (either 32bit or 64bit). After that it's 512MB of Ram, 430MB of hard disc space, a 1024x768 or greater display, a mouse or tablet and a DVD drive. There are four main applications in the box all with the X4 suffix, CorelDRAW, Corel PhotoPaint, Corel PowerTrace and Corel Capture.

Although the Concise Oxford Dictionary lists definitions that include "Soul of dead person in Hades" and "bright spot or secondary image in field of telescope due to defect of lens", Symantec would like you to think of Ghost as the preferred method of protecting your computer with advanced backup and recovery technology.

So what I am looking at is two different anti virus programs from the same maker. Drive Sentry and Drive Sentry Go Anywhere. The first sits on your PC and the second resides on your stick drive so you can safely insert it into another PC which may or may not be infected by a virus or three. I have used both the full PC package and the stick drive version. My problem is that unless you get a virus you will never know if the products work.

Digital photographs do have a tendency to be rather large in size.  You only have to look at the ever increasing megapixel ratings of the latest cameras, and even the new crop of mobile phones, to see the reason for the demands that digital photos put on certain activities.  Digital images can quickly devour storage space and are hardly the sleekest when it comes to being sent via the Web even for those of us with access to a fast Broadband connection.

Take a distinct flavour of the old Wild West, throw in some unusual, some might say gruesome elements, and then mix them with a modern computer game.  The result is CowBall, a game from URSE Games, developed by a team led by Sergey Kuzmichev and Juriy Aliev who were responsible for titles such as Gem Ball and Nuclear Ball. As already mentioned, CowBall is set in the Wild West of cowboys and Red Indians.

Getting your message across to your targeted audience can be difficult as the best of times.  It does help if you are able to apply a certain amount of pizzazz to the actual presentation of your message.  One method of achieving this pizzazz, or audience-appealing gloss, could be through the use of a program entitled Crazy Talk from Reallusion. Now up to version 5, Crazy Talk Pro is face puppet animation software with a number of new and enhanced features.

Developed by Sonic Team, Phantasy Star Universe is set in the Gurhal Star System that originally formed the game playing arena for Phantasy Star Online.  Bringing together the ability to choose between single player game and online network action, Phantasy Star Universe belongs to the Japanese RPG genre.  Now available on the White label, Phantasy Star Universe has been rated at 12+ and forms part of the Avanquest Software Publishing product portfolio.